Brad Marchand on Matt Cooke: ‘It’s not even in our minds right now’

Posted By
Mike Petraglia
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May 29, 2013 @ 5:02 pm
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General |
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WILMINGTON — The Bruins are not consumed with exacting revenge on Matt Cooke[1].

As Brad Marchand[2] reminded everyone on Wednesday after practice, the stakes now are way too high to get into revenge games for a hit that happened three seasons ago.

Of course, the hit that is etched in the mind of every Bruins fan when you mention the name Matt Cooke[1] is the blindside hit he laid on the head of Marc Savard[3] on March 7, 2010. That hit resulted in a Grade 2 concussion. After sitting out the first round of the playoffs, Savard scored the game-winner against the Flyers in overtime in Game 1.

Savard, however, was never the same player. After suffering another concussion 10 months later, he was shut down for the season and could not participate in the run to the Cup title.

How do the Bruins deal with their emotions on Cooke?

“Well, it depends what you mean by that,” Claude Julien[4] said. “Are you talking about the Savard thing? Or are you talking about the way Matt Cooke plays. There’s different ways of answering that. At one point, you’ve got to move on from certain things. Just like the next question will be like [Jarome] Iginla. Stuff like that. We all know about that. The thing we have to focus on is finding a way to win the series. If you just want revenge on this guy or that guy. Is it really the right focus to have? The best way to get that satisfaction is by winning a series. So I think that’s where your focus has to be.”

Asked on Wednesday what he thought of Cooke, Marchand, a rookie in 2010, agreed with his coach, adding the Bruins can’t worry about exacting some measure of personal revenge.

“He’s playing well right now,” Marchand began, before offering a bit of backhanded compliment. “If you watched the Ottawa series, he’s running around a bit but he’s doing some things offensively, too. He’s doing good things for the team. We’re not going to focus on any single guy over there. They’ve got four lines that can do damage so he’s just another guy who’s on their team.

“It’s a completely different season. We’re not worried about that at all anymore. It’s a long time ago. There’s much bigger things at stake than that hit. It’s not even in our minds right now.”

Marchand’s primary focus is to work with Patrice Bergeron[5] to try and get linemate Jaromir Jagr into the goal-scoring column against the team he began his NHL[6] career with.

“He’s doing a lot of good things right now, making a lot of plays,” Marchand said of Jagr. “He’s in the right spot a lot of the time. He’s getting a ton of opportunities. You really only have to start worrying when you don’t get any opportunities and that’s not the case for him. So hopefully, they’ll start going in for Jags.”

The other priority will be to keep a close eye on the Penguins[7]‘ highly potent second line of Evgeni Malkin, Jarome Iginla and James Neal. Marchand said keeping the puck in the offensive zone will be a big part of Boston’s defensive attack when those three are on the ice.

“That’s definitely a big part of playing like a line against that,” Marchand said. “They want to play in the offensive zone, and if we can find a way to keep them down in the defensive end and work it down there, it limits their opportunity to score. We want to play in their end as much as possible, but it’s not an easy thing to do with the skill and talent they have over there.”